Hysterical Strength
by bisexualcharliedavis
Summary: "My daddy had to take his leg off." He continued, even if it was hurting him. "I reckon he took off all his good sense as well." (Dr Quinn MD Au, past!Charlie/Lawson)


/an au of the western au based on my favorite moment of the Dr Quinn pilot. Love that show, damn. Anyway im calling this au Dr O'Brian, medicine woman. :-) this isn't actually how this au would play out, but I liked this idea so. Au of an au. No real warnings I guess. Poor Charlie, tbh. Leave a review if you liked it!

Mattie watched Charlie from behind as he kneaded bread. No matter how long she stayed in this town, she'd never quite gotten the hang of bread. Charlie, apparently had. His hands are expert as they knead the bread. A dash of flower, he pulled the dough toward him, then pressed it with the heel of his hand. His shirt is rolled to his elbows, she could see the tiny scars on his elbow, typical on someone who's had as much blood drawn and as many shots of this or that.

According to Rose, her uncle in law kept his home exactly as he had when he'd been married. Sitting on the shelf with his cooking books, was a picture of him, slightly younger, slightly less stressed, standing against a taller and much older man. The older man, if Rose's descriptions were anything to go by, was her uncle Matthew Lawson. Charlie is beaming, unusual in a wedding photo, with one hand on Lawson's chest. Lawson has a hand on his elbow and is holding him close.

"Rose took that." Charlie said, from where he was preparing the bread for the oven.

"Yeah?"  
"Always had a great eye." She nodded, and looked over at him as he put the bread in the large cast iron oven.

"I've noticed." It goes quiet. Charlie might have allowed her to rent his father's old practice, and he might allow her to board with him, but he certainly was not more friendly.

"Don't take it personally." Rose had advised. "Charlie's just not friendly to anyone anymore."

"What happened?"  
"He lost his daddy and his husband real close together, he never got over it."

"He looks..."  
"Like a ghost?"  
"Yeah."  
"He is."

"Are you feeling well?" She asked, as Charlie lowered himself into one of the seats in the homestead.

"Better then last week." Pause. "Thank you, Doctor."  
"Well you already knew what to do. Just bed rest and willowbark tea, I think." He gave a little nod, and looked down at his hands. Over the winter, his circulation got bad, apparently. His eyes drift to his wedding band, still sitting on the bottom of his left ring finger.

"Charlie, if you don't mind me asking, how did your husband die?" Charlie looks up, with raised eyebrows, as if he was asking how do you know about that?

"Rose told me that you were married to her uncle." She said, in defense of herself.

"She was my best friend, when I was young. Didn't matter to her that I was essentially bed ridden. It was always odd to think of myself as her uncle in law." He commented, picking up a brown glass decanter and feeling it's weight between his fingers. As far as Mattie knew, Charlie never drank from it, just liked holding it, the odd man that he was.

"To answer your question, Doc, he ain't. 'S far as I know, he's out there, somewhere, alive and kickin'."

"They called you widower Lawson."

"They're kind folks." Charlie replies, setting the decanter down. "But they all knows that Matthew Lawson ain't dead." Pause. "Just gone." He gave a light shrug. "Used to be the sheriff of this town, he was." Charlie said, picking up a wedding photo from the side table, and passing it to her. They look so pleased. Charlie is sitting in a chair, pale and fragile as he ever was, Lawson standing behind him, hand on his shoulder.

"His horse fell on his leg, one day. Got shot by accident. The bloke wasn't tryn'a shoot him, just spook him. He shot the horse, ans it fell. He got crushed under it." Long, long pause. Charlie accepts his wedding photo back, and traced his fingers along Lawson's jawline.

"My daddy had to take his leg off." He continued, even if it was hurting him. "I reckon he took off all his good sense as well." He sounds sad. "He still got an infection, though. My daddy was the best doctor 'round these parts but it wasn't enough. 'O course I was sick at the time and I wasn't allowed to sit with him 'till daddy was sure he wasn't gonna make it." Mattie raised her eyebrows. Rose never mentioned her uncle having only one leg. "I sat with him for three days and two nights before he started to recover. Dunno what sparked it. Don't wanna know. I was real happy to have my husband come back to me. Thought it was God sayin' that we deserved to be happy."

Mattie sits back in her chair and looks into the fire. It's a cold day out today. Charlie's been sick the whole winter on and off, but at least he's out of bed now. Willow bark tea was all she'd been able to give him, at least to relive the pain. He'd spoken a lot about his daddy while delirious with fever.

"Out here though, God does deals with 'ya. He gave me my husband, but he took my daddy." He said, "Went off to go find his real family. His wife and real kid. Said that I'd be right and me and Matthew could look after one another." Pause. "He didn't think that the town needed a doctor though. So I took over as the doc. Apparently that wasn't enough for my lovely husband, since he took off a couple months later." Charlie reaches into his pants pocket to produce a letter, well read and creased. "He left me this. Sayin' that he loved me, that he was sorry, didn't give me no reason though. I guess by takin' him they gave us you, to look after this town

"Charlie...They aren't gone."

"See Doc, that's where we're different. You don't see the world the same as me. You have the whole world to live in. Mine ends at this town. No way I'd be well enough for a train trip into the city to see him. He wouldn't even see Rose when she tried to speak on my behalf."

"You kept his last name."  
"I still love him. I'd take him back in a heart beat, if he gave me the chance." Charlie said, softly. "Prove to him that he means more to me then my Daddy's practice. Prove him that I love him." Charlie has one of those bitter smiles on his lips. "Everyone always says they have my best interests at heart, don't they?" He asked. "'Course when Daddy left, he took my job. Then when Matthew left he took my support system. I can barely work so much of the year." He lamented, "How am I meant to work when I'm so ill ?When they were here all they did was help me and coddle me, and all I ever wanted was for them to recognize that I could look after myself sometimes." He scoffs. Mattie feels a strange tug of sympathy at her heart.

"How about you?" Charlie asked, "You mentioned to Rose that you were engaged."

"Once."

Oh! Joe, she thought, thinking of her lost love.

"His name was Joe." She smiled, "I met him when I was studying. Most men didn't like me too much, thought I was too smart and too loud." Long pause, she gathers her thoughts on Joe. She didn't like talking about him much, but Charlie had been so open that she can't help but share her thoughts as well.

"He liked to debate with me. He spoke to me like an equal. My intellectual equal, I think." She stands, pouring herself a drink from one of Charlie's many dusty decanters, and then swallows it in one go. Rose was right. This stuff has been here for years.

"He asked me to marry him before he asked my father. I always liked that. Of course, my father thought he was a fine young man, and after all, if I was married then wouldn't I be more likely to settle down? To stop all this ambition nonsense?" She asked, rhetorically. Charlie, understandably, has no response.

"One night, he came to see me, dressed in an officers uniform." She said, looking up at him. "Told me, he was going to go away and fight, and that he would be back soon" Long pause. Charlie is looking at her, those blue eyes staring her down, assessing her. "I don't know why he did that. He wanted peace. He always wanted peace, that was what we used to discuss together. Peace. Happiness. But he was so proud to be fighting and I asked him why and he said that his father told him he had to." She looked up at Charlie, who looks saddened.

"And then, one day, the letters stopped and I thought to myself that perhaps he was just busy." A long long, moment passes. She's clearly trying not to cry but she's not sure she can. "Until I got a telegram." She begins to cry in earnest then, unable to hold back the tears. Charlie got to his feet, and then pulled her into his arms, tight up against his chest.

It's not the same as her father, her mother, or Joe. It's not even really Charlie. It's the both of them, two who have loved and lost, offering comfort to the other. She cries, and cries and cries. She'd not had much time to grieve over Joe, she'd thrown herself into her studies at full force, ready to make him proud and she'd thought that she was okay. If the rapidly growing stains on Charlie Davis's waist coat are anything to go by, she clearly wasn't.

They stand there for a long time, in the quiet. It's Charlie who breaks it.

"It doesn't matter how we lose them. Pain's always the same." He murmured, into her hair. "You'll be okay." He said, releasing her. "My prescription is hot bread with butter." He said, looking at the kitchen. Mattie nods in agreement.

"I think that's a might fine prescription." She agrees, wiping her eyes with the back of her sleeve.


End file.
